


the phantom menace

by thefudge



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Eerie, F/M, Stalking, jedi!rose tico, ost: poppy - play destroy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:01:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24010237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefudge/pseuds/thefudge
Summary: Life is still. Death vibrates. AU. (rose tico/anakin skywalker)
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker/Rose Tico, Rose Tico/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 18
Kudos: 26





	the phantom menace

**Author's Note:**

> i wanted to write a small thing for May 4th and I decided on this oneshot based on an idea I had a couple of months back. Hope you enjoy!

_Don’t look back, don’t look back, don’t look back..._

She recites the words in patronymic fervor, prayer-like, as if they could stand in for this great feeling inside of her. Fear and awe.

She slashes the air around her, cutting through ghosts.

Life is still. Death vibrates.

The tall figure approaches softly. She is hardly ready for him, but she moves quickly, jumping from rock to rock, muttering the words under her breath.

Rose runs across the bank, stirring the still life.

Emerald water laps at her feet. The air is sweet with sunset. The luscious scenery does not care that she is being hunted.

He chases after her, lithe and powerful and untouchable, amber eyes following like twin moons. 

She clutches her half-moon medallion and keeps running.

She has never believed in the power of his name, but she does now. The sky bends to him. 

From time to time, he tries to drag her towards him with the tight cord of the Force, but she doesn’t let herself get caught.

Her boots scrape against the temple steps. She climbs two at a time.

Before she can reach the top, he is already there waiting for her.

His hood is lowered.

He is ageless and innocent and terrifying.

Rose clambers up the column’s marble top and jumps from column to column, avoiding the blaze of his Force. It licks at her ankles.

She runs deep into the temple.

Anakin Skywalker strides after her. The sun melts its red crown behind him. Light diminishes.

Her eyes are not trained for this half-light and the sparks of the saber are blinding.

They clash in twilight.

Saber glides against saber and releases. She darts back and forth, dancing on a pin’s head. His robes billow like dark smoke. He is a shadow. She tries to follow his eyes, the only living thing about him.

The shock of their weapons makes her teeth clatter. Rose pushes back, angling away, ducking low and using her size to get away from him. But Anakin knows about crevices and corners. He grew up in small places. She cannot hide.

Rose-veined blocks of marble crumble into pieces behind her. She clenches her fist, making the stones rain upon him, but he moves them aside easily.

“What do you want?” Rose cries out, reaching for the faint light of an exit.

The terrace in front of her leads to a small dock full of pleasure crafts. She could take one. She could get away.

The fistful of Force slams into her and makes her stumble, lightsaber clattering down the steps. She crawls for it, but the tug of his Force reels her in. 

Rose is lifted in the air. She glides towards him in the bruised blue of dusk.

He catches her, his metal fingers wrapping round her throat. Rose clutches at his arm.

“Let – me – go.”

His expression is slightly puzzled. There’s the trace of a smile on his lips. Friendly, almost boyish. As if they are playing a sporting match and there’s a prize at the end. She remembers reading about him in Kenobi’s memoirs, about the charming young man who never seemed to want to do any harm to anyone. 

With the other hand, he picks up the half-moon medallion dangling on her chest. 

“Where did you get this?”

His voice is soft and friendly and urgent. He’s here to help, it seems to say. He’s going to be the best Jedi of his generation, you see.

“My sister gave it to me,” she spits out, struggling for release.

His amber eyes fill with something dreadful, almost like tenderness. “No. She couldn’t have. It’s mine.”

“It’s Haysian ore from my planet,” Rose bites back. “And you’re _dead_.”

Anakin frowns. “I don’t feel very dead.”

He lifts his good hand to her cheek. His touch is warm and mundane. Calloused fingers stroking skin. Rose flinches.

“Do I?” he asks.

Rose breathes harshly. “I don’t know what you are, but you can’t be real.”

He’s certainly not a Force ghost, as far as she can tell. He’s not the corpse of Darth Vader. He’s –

Maybe this is a nightmare. Maybe it’s the fish from last night. It did not sit well with her. She should have never come to Naboo. But Mistress Leia had wanted her to retrieve her mother’s remaining possessions. 

Anakin brings her head closer, metal finger scraping, sinking into cheek. It’s strange to feel his curls tickling her forehead. His breath is cold.

“I’m as real as you. You’re the one who called me.” 

There’s calculation behind those amber eyes, curiosity too. Yet all of it, soft and young.

“I didn’t,” she grits. 

Rose reaches out behind her. She can feel the static between her fingers. Her saber flies to her.

Anakin releases her before she lights it.

He steps back.

Rose clutches her weapon. She could stay and fight him, but she knows she would lose. And right now, all she wants is to get away from this... anomaly.

She runs towards the dock as fast as her feet will carry her, using the Force to guide her against obstacles.

_Don’t look back, don’t look back, don’t look back…_

Rose bypasses the identification code and starts the ship’s engine. The skiff glides against water like a bird’s claw tracing the surface. Waves churn and die in her wake. Her hair escapes the confines of her tight knot, whipping against her face punishingly.

She shouldn’t look back.

She shouldn’t.

She looks back.

Anakin Skywalker stands on the pier, in the flesh, watching her. Allowing her narrow escape.

Even from afar, the smile is boyish. Ready for adventure. The universe is so big, so ripe.

 _This isn’t over_ , the Force whispers in her ear.

The cool breeze against her cheek feels like metal fingers. 


End file.
